We’re excited to introduce you to the always interesting and insightful Linda Manias. We hope you’ll enjoy our conversation with Linda below.
Alright, Linda thanks for taking the time to share your stories and insights with us today. Owning a business isn’t always glamorous and so most business owners we’ve connected with have shared that on tough days they sometimes wonder what it would have been like to have just had a regular job instead of all the responsibility of running a business. Have you ever felt that way?
Owning a business has been an opportunity to expand on my passion, be myself, and to turn ideas into reality. Watching a customer bite into a delicious recipe that we developed is extremely gratifying. Being a small business allows me to be closer to the community, which has been a beautiful experience.
As always, we appreciate you sharing your insights and we’ve got a few more questions for you, but before we get to all of that can you take a minute to introduce yourself and give our readers some of your back background and context?
When I moved away from Italy for the first time in my mid-twenties to South Dakota, I quickly became desperate for my northern Italian breakfast, pastries and cake. When I first looked up recipes and sourced ingredients, I didn’t know it was the beginning of a business adventure. After a year, we moved back to my home in Italy where my baking passion grew deeper. With travel restrictions and closures across Europe during COVID, we knew it was time to relocate back to the United States to share what rarely exists, a northern Italian style cafe.
How’d you meet your business partner?
My husband has been my business partner. When we met in Italy I didn’t think I would ever travel to the United States, let alone own a business here. I didn’t speak English yet, so it is amazing time changes things.
Learning and unlearning are both critical parts of growth – can you share a story of a time when you had to unlearn a lesson?
The culture in Italy is very strong and much different than the United States. There are customs and norms that I have grown up with that do not apply here and vice versa. We had employee would whistle when she was happy, for example, and I thought she was being rude, because it is in Italy. To my surprise, she was just happy!
Contact Info:
- Website: https://www.lindasdolci.com/
- Instagram: https://Instagram.com/lindasdolci
- Facebook: https://www.facebook.com/lindasdolcialternativi/
Image Credits
Linda Manias